Departing Wellington, we made our way to Ohakune. On the way there we made a couple of stops. The first one was a township called Bulls, great slogans using their name all over various shops and businesses – make sure to stop and read a few if you pass through here! Our next stop was Taihape, also known as the gumboot capital of the world. Here they hold gumboot throwing competitions, of course, we had to stop and have a go ourselves.
Our last stop before reaching Ohakune was the memorial on Whangaehu River. This pays respect to the 151 passengers out of 285 that died in New Zealand’s worst railway accident. At 10.21 pm on Christmas Eve in 1953, the Wellington-Auckland night express crashed into the flooded Whangaehu River at Tangiwai.
Once we had arrived in Ohakune after dinner we spent the evening watching the All-Blacks play rugby in the world cup.
Unfortunately, the weather wasn’t great for our day in Ohakuna, a few people made it up on to the mountain for some skiing and snowboarding. Those of us who didn’t choose to do this went for High-T at the Chateau Tongariro which was lovely plus we could watch the snow falling whilst in the warm enjoying a lovely cuppa.
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